Levy discussion

Seafish has changed. In autumn 2011 we asked industry their
views on whether the 21st century seafood industry still needed a
body like Seafish. They responded with an emphatic "yes", but said
that change was needed to make Seafish the body they required, and
asked Seafish to improve its offer.

The four UK Fisheries Ministers agreed that Seafish should
overhaul its approach to designing corporate strategy and provide
greater transparency about how activities are agreed. New Industry
Panels were created to identify their sector's priorities, work
streams and resources. The Board used these recommendations to put
together Seafish's new
corporate plan which, for the first time, has been developed
through a bottom-up approach.

The industry also believed that a statutory levy remained the
fairest way to fund an organisation whose objectives span the
diverse industry. Ministers acknowledged the importance of ensuring
the levy is collected on a fair basis and noted that a review of
levy rates had not been undertaken in the last decade. Ministers
therefore agreed that a review of the levy should take place once
Seafish had published its Corporate Plan. In response, Seafish are
keen to explore a number of potential changes to the levy over the
next few years and are beginning discussions with industry on a
proposal to reduce the levy rate.

Seafish invited opinions on proposals to;

Reduce the amount of levy collected to a projected total annual
levy income of £7.2m.

Rationale for change

The proposed changes are designed to ensure that the amount of
levy collected balances the expenditure proposed in the corporate
plan.

The proposal to reduce the standard levy rate by 10% is a step
towards the fairer system required by industry. It will narrow the
gap between the standard rate and the lower rates that certain
categories, such as cockles, mussels, whelks, pelagic fish, fish
for fishmeal and imported fishmeal, attract. For example, the levy
on pelagic fish is less than 30% of the standard rate, whereas the
value of certain pelagic species, such as mackerel, is higher than
some species on which levy is charged at the standard rate, e.g.
dogfish. The reduction in 10% of standard rate is in our view the
simplest, fairest and most straightforward way to implement a
reduction in levy.

A reduction of more than 10% at this stage risks leaving Seafish
with a shortfall in income and unable to fulfil its duties as
specified by industry.

The consultation with industry on a potential levy reduction of
10% has now closed. Thank you to those who took part in the
discussions online and via post. We will now consider our response
to the replies we received and publish it shortly. More
announcement will be made via our newsletter, online here at our
website and via the trade press.